Singer elected president of Haiti

Popular singer and carnival entertainer Michel Martelly has been elected president of Haiti.

Eduardo Munoz : Reuters

Popular singer and carnival entertainer Michel Martelly has been elected president of Haiti with 67.57 per cent of the vote, preliminary results showed.

Mr Martelly triumphed in the March 20 run-off over former first lady Mirlande Manigat, who finished with 31.74 per cent of votes cast, according to results given by a member of the electoral commission.

Definitive results of the presidential and legislative elections are due to be announced on April 16, after any legal complaints have been resolved.

'Sweet Micky' Martelly, a head-shaved 50-year-old with no previous government experience, had preached a forceful message of change, pledging to break with decades of past corruption and misrule and to bring a better life to Haitians struggling to recover from a devastating 2010 earthquake.

His campaign tweeted the reports of his win. There was no immediate reaction from Ms Manigat's camp.

As president, Mr Martelly will face the huge challenge of trying to rebuild a small Caribbean country that was prostrated in poverty long before an earthquake killed more than 300,000 people and bludgeoned its fragile economy last year.

Hundreds of thousands of destitute earthquake victims are still living in squalid tent and tarpaulin camps.

Anxious anticipation tinged with fears of violence had gripped the country since the preliminary results announcement was delayed from last week because of reported high levels of fraud.

Blue-helmeted UN peacekeepers were out patrolling the capital, Port-au-Prince, and other potential flashpoints. Some stores boarded up windows in anticipation of trouble.